A tour to Hongluo Mountain in Huairou was arranged for ITCS students and faculty during Oct. 30-31 to get refreshed in the nature. Prof. Wang, Prof. Sun and Prof. Hu also attended the tour in spite of their full schedule, which greatly aroused our expectation in the following day.

We set off at 5pm on Oct. 30 from FIT Building although it was still raining. On the way, our postdocs were asked to give us performances. Kevin sang the American anthem, Henry told us the story in the song after his singing, and John sang the songs in both French and English. Their performances were too enjoyable for us to pay any attention to the traffic jam and bad weather outside. Soon we got to Hongda Hotel, where we were going to spend a night.

After the dinner, we joined the entertainments, such as swimming, bowling, shuffle board, table tennis, billiards, Kara OK, etc. Prof. Wang’s songs won the big applause in KTV, while Prof. Sun competed with our postdocs in bowling. All the students and teachers showed their best and enjoyed themselves completely.

In the sunny morning of the next day, we drove to the best-known tourist attraction in Huairou—Hongluo Temple. Hongluo Mountain was covered with red leaves all over in deep autumn. Having taken a group photo at the foot of mountain, we began the climbing and rushed to the top.

We were enjoying the scenery all along the way. The guiding flag attracted the passers-by’s attention and received their admiring eyes. Prof. Wang led the way to the top; our high spirits never ceased on the way up. Standing on the top with everything under foot, we felt the great joy of conquest. No pains, no gains. This is a universal truth.

Back from the mountain, we had lunch in a famous restaurant in Huairou, called Nali, and enjoyed the local delicacy—rainbow trout there. Next was the exciting game, Half-life Counter Strike. We were split into two teams—Green Team and Blue Team. Everyone behaved bravely in the battles. Prof. Sun, Hongyi Yao, Nathaniel and John were all dead shots, and “killed” many enemies heroically. The victory of Blue Team ended the battle. Though defeated, Green Team learned a lesson that team spirit and assignment allotment played key roles in the accomplishment of a task.

Happy time always flied! Bearing the delightful experiences in Huairou in mind, we will bring our high spirit in climbing to the peak and team spirit in battles to our study and daily life.

After the lunch at the Wild Duck Restaurant, we were on our way back with pleasant experiences and memories.

This activity was not only a good opportunity for us to enjoy the natural scenery and the pleasure of horse-riding, but also a happy gathering for us to get known to each other and to show our positive spirit. With this, we are more confident in establishing a world class research center on computer science.